


Step Shift

by 7veilsphaedra



Category: Saiyuki Gaiden
Genre: M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-09
Updated: 2013-01-09
Packaged: 2017-11-24 07:03:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/631734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/7veilsphaedra/pseuds/7veilsphaedra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nothing ever changes in Tenkai, except when it does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Step Shift

Something happened, as they played out their usual ritual on that otherwise ordinary day for the umpteenth time, the ritual which always took place when they passed each other in that same palace hall as King Goujun made his way to his office. Their strides would tap out the same rhythm as they approached each other from opposite directions. Their shadows would rotate in the same sundial progression against the patterned lines cast by ornamental window lattice along the floors and base of the opposite wall. Sentinel columns which stood like at regular intervals marked precise five-second beats on an analogue clock face to the sound of their footfalls. The air was pregnant with regimentation and the ever-blooming, ever-scattering, never-fruiting blossoms.

This time, however, tufts of hair under King Goujun’s scales lifted as his subordinate strutted past--straining, shimmering electrical currents in search of a ground. He could smell the god, a tincture of warm sun, tree bark, clay, sake and blossoms--the scent so filling his head that his feet felt clumsy, yet aloft. It was the scent of someone who had spent the entire morning lying on his back on the grass looking up at the sky, shot with a fomenting undercurrent of something muskier, darker and smokier.

“A soldier is required to greet his superiors with due deference.” Goujun had pivoted, snapping his fingers once, as falling petals that had blown through the open casements swirled in the wake of his cloak. “Isn’t it about time you got it right?”

Kenren was out of place amidst orderly rows of palace offices and apartments--each identically small and square--a scruffy dandelion, the colour of sunshine, in a gloomy bed of chrysanthemums. Other courtiers murmured about his activities, so frivolous, feckless and wasteful; in Heaven, who ever stared at a sky and dreamed? Goujun fancied he understood. Kenren probably couldn’t contain himself. Palaces were too cramped to hold him.

“Yeah, yeah, sooo sorry. Hello,” Kenren sang, bobbing his sloppy bow like a magpie on a perch, coat tails swinging wide, the heel of his boot scuffing the floor as he swivelled to leave. “And goodbye.”

Surges of heat swept through Goujun’s body at this informality. The general’s uniform was nothing short of its usual shambolic insolence--buttons undone, threads pulled, wrinkled--except this time it also caused the king’s breaths to shorten, his pulse to quicken, and his blood to stream more vigorously than at any other moment in the dreary changelessness of Tenkai. Surprisingly, not out of rage.

“General!”

“What? I got places to be, people to see. You know the drill: I’m still working on someone else’s dime.”

“Is that a flask of liquor?”

“Yeah, your honorari-ship. Same as always: my special diet plan.”

Anybody who flew in the face of Tenkai’s overweening conformity had to be prepared for a backlash, and now, in the innermost chambers of his heart, the dragon king could not fault his general for being stubborn and heedless--even if he bucked traditions which Goujun espoused in word and deed.

“You must continue to thank Marshal Tenpou, of course, for continuing to plead on behalf of your continued employment.”

Word and deed did not follow the heart in this court. The endless protocols and procedures were the equivalent of knitting delicate headdresses to festoon volcanoes. Goujun seethed at being ordered to step aside for the Emperor’s champion; his troops seethed with the impotency of repeated orders to stand down in their missions; the smarter gods wondered where all the monsters unleashed on Tougenkyou were coming from, and seethed at the restraints placed on their investigations. Bedrock was bubbling within everyone. Goujun could feel channels of molten fire rise within him. He tamped it down with watery element of his spiritual home, but feared there would be a day when this power grew to such a compressed state of energy that it would erupt with a kinetic force that rivalled nature.

“Yeah? Well, you just make sure this old war-dog doesn’t bite you in the ass, either.” Kenren shot over his shoulder as he sailed off. “Oh, that’s right … Ta-taaaa, toodle-oooo and good¬bye!”

Kindness and gratitude were in no way the forces behind General Kenren’s assignment to King Goujun. Ordinary transfers never came with rap sheets which unscrolled the length of an entire room, spilling down his desk and across his floor like a carpet for a visiting diplomat, filled with insult and injury--affronts against the commanding officer’s own kin.

Only transfers fraught with implicit conspiracy were couched in words so evasive to pin, but so clearly implied: to subdue the general, crush his spirit, shatter his mind, break his body and leave it crumpled in a ditch somewhere for the crows to pick. Enemies, so numerous and powerful, the scroll was a thicket of red seals.

Maybe it was sympathy, the understanding of one lesser son of a noble house to another. Maybe it was his own latent rebellion, chafing at the constraints of Heaven which had become so arbitrary and senseless of late--rules for the sake of rules, restrictions with no apparent purpose other than control. Goujun was unfailingly loyal to the Emperor, but it was stretching thin. Maybe Goujun had been corrupted by his heterodox field marshal, that odd, withdrawn, cerebral kami. Upon discovering this, however--

Kenren was voraciously, almost maniacally sexual. Skilled, too, if the seduction rate was any indication. It had been even worse to learn that his passions and appetites extended to male and female alike--worse because it stoked something Goujun was trying to smother.

In the cloistered privacy of their strategic planning sessions, Tenpou never felt the slightest scruple in withholding explicit details of Kenren’s conquests. Indeed, the marshal seemed to take fiendish pleasure in tormenting the King with these accounts. The general’s exploits were so psychologically astute and imprudent, Goujun’s mind couldn’t help but consider what a leader Kenren might be had he ever turned that savvy and energy toward his job. Without that direction, the kami was dangerous, a loose cannon. The dragon-king suspected Tenpou set up these stories as a blind, to draw his attention away from the other havocs Kenren wreaked.

“I think our problem child was up to his old antics again last night.” The field marshal would start, as he always started. “This time it was our fellow general, Enrai’s, wife.”

In Goujun’s agitation, he knocked a tray of royal gewgaws and military nonsense off his desk.

“I knew I should’ve taken the battalion to the southern desert for war-games,” he growled.

Clamour ensued, of course. Some of it actually had the audacity to knock on his door and enter on the lips of various flunkeys.

“Your majesty, you have to do something!”

“It’s a spit in our eye, a black mark on our honour!”

“Our battalion’s morale’s been completely demolished!”

Oi, oi, oi!

Outside the palace, the parade ground was a disgrace, with troops who acted like headless poultry. He was more annoyed about that--mild annoyance being the strongest sense of outrage he could muster.

As bevies of females at the drinking houses could attest, it wasn’t as though Enrai had ever actually loved his wife; their arranged marriage had been pure _kabuki,_ like every other royal wheel’n’deal in this tainted court. This was more about Kenren taking liberties with someone Enrai considered his personal property.

Goujun, in spite of being a relatively young and inexperienced commander, knew exactly how to handle the problem.

He ordered the battalion onto the fields for a war-game.

“Fighters, choose your own team! General Kenren, direct the western field. General Enrai, the east.”

Naturally, allowed free choice, the soldiers split according to their loyalties. Before they could rearrange themselves into a less intuitive formation, however, Goujun stopped them, neatly dividing the battalion along those fissures into two new squadrons under the two leaders.

All done.

At an initial glance, it appeared grossly unequal: Kenren’s squad barely numbered over a dozen, whereas Enrai’s measured near forty. It was only after the quality of the soldiers was taken into account that the advantage tilted in the other direction—overwhelmingly, for Kenren had attracted the truly skilled, cunning and brave.

Misfits all, Goujun wiped the dust off his hands onto his trousers. Kenren was going to have his hands full, score one! Ergo that mouth, that temper, that horndog libido would have less time to cause mischief. The less time there was for Kenren to mess around, score two, the less fucking around he would get to do. Win-win for the dragon-king.

Enrai was left with the sheep.

Afterward, for some strange reason, Tenpou continued to provide extraordinarily detailed (and stimulating) descriptions of Kenren’s affairs. It drove Goujun half out of his wits with paranoia, heat, anger, jealousy and obstructed desire. Fortunately, Tenpou also offered stress-relief on the side, or the dragon king would’ve exploded.

Goujun quite liked his marshal. Tenpou’s droll observations, the flashes of wit and curiosity, even the way he forgot to eat, sleep and bathe when immersed in some fascination satisfied Goujun. He liked to recline next to his marshal on the mats and run his fingers across that silken skin, so empty of texture. Tenpou’s tongue always moved upon him like his scales were filled with honey. Tenpou writhed under him like an undulating sea serpent. Tenpou would shove his hand in his mouth when he came to keep from crying out, and it was a winsome thing to do. Goujun allowed him to take more liberties than anyone else under his command, but he didn’t feel used. The marshal’s enjoyment of his company seemed sincere.

All the same, the air inside the palace and barracks was getting too stagnant and still. Dust and mould had started to smell stronger than pollen. The place felt heavier than usual.

Long passages of time could only be marked by the echoes of feet tramping from one end to the other of the long corridor outside his office door. Goujun could read who was passing his door by the sound of their boots: Tenpou padded like a great cat; the strange new heretic rumoured to be the ward of Konzen Douji had a perky trot and a half-skip; Li Touten barrelled like an ox, or maybe more like a wild-eyed prophet run amok knocking over trash bins and cursing the stars; Nataku strode--very deliberate, very on-track; the Merciful Goddess either slunk along with a slinky sort of anklet-jingling half-shuffle or tripped and danced on her toes like a fox, depending on whether male or female predominated that day, Goujun could never figure out which; Kenren--well, his stomps were unpredictable with some kind of silent swing beat caught in them.

But Kenren was making enemies everywhere, and Goujun’s secret obsession with the general had to wither. It must be excised.

Act upon it, he did, however--against his own awareness.

The next time Kenren proceeded to saunter along the corridor, neglecting due deference as usual so that the dragon king was compelled to bring him to heel yet again, all he could manage was the gentle reprimand, “General, I am your superior, and you must salute me.”

He had tried to bristle and snarl, to steel every sinew with threat, let light glint off his needle-sharp incisors. He couldn’t. The strength had drained from his limbs, the force from his lungs.

“Uh, sure … Hello.” Kenren seemed startled. He gave the perfunctory bow. “Goodbye.”

What? No lip? No smartass? No backtalk?

The very next day, in his office, Tenpou remarked out of the blue, “Our first general must like and respect you an awful lot.”

“Sorry?”

The only thing Goujun could do was sit there, agape, royal seal in hand, and wait for the inevitable punchline. This took longer than he expected. He was still waiting when Tenpou shifted off edge of the commode where he’d been leaning and closed the book he had been leafing through with a snap.

“If he disliked or disrespected you, you would be up to your ears in earwigs by now.”

Goujun felt like he was already up to his ears in the crawly things.

“How do you manage to keep the problem child on such a tight leash, Marshal?” was the only thing which Goujun could think of in response.

Tenpou set the book down.

Goujun returned to the task of dipping his seal into red ink and leave his mark on various dispatches.

A breeze blew in from the garden, riffling through papers, causing the silk pennants on Goujun’s walls to dance.

“I don’t,” Tenpou said. “And anyway, he would lash out.”

The air smelled of fresh-mown grass.

“I’ve already made it clear that he’s highly susceptible to pleasure.” Tenpou mused.

Goujun wished he’d get to the point. “What are you implying?”

Tenpou walked over and planted a companionable kiss upon his cheek. As he tenderly stroked feathers of hair off Goujun’s forehead, he said, “Someone who was not infatuated would’ve cut me off the second I mentioned he was sleeping around.”

What he didn’t say, Goujun noticed, was what he thought the dragon-king should do about it.

Over the course of days, his scales began to feel like paper. His normally bluish whites had acquired a rosy cast. He was alternately hot, then cold outside of the temperature of his environment, the perfect picture of a dragon in season.

It was a good thing for him that the other dragon kings had their hands full in their domains. Goujun didn’t think he could’ve withstood their scrutiny, or living hell!—whatever plan they would scheme up between themselves to deal with it. He had to find his own solution quickly, because no matter how puckishly Tenpou might hint and encourage, he was not about to order a partner to have sex with him based on someone else’s assurances that it would be okay.

To cool his overheated skin, Goujun took to nature, walking long and far in the darknesses before dawn, diving into pools and rivers, chasing breezes and shades.

He also started varying his routines—not drastically, not to the point where business was being neglected—but instead of breaking fast at precisely four-thirty every morning, he sometimes ate at five; instead of sweeping through a dozen passes of sword-forms, he varied them with pike forms or bo staff; instead of booking meetings with Tenpou for nine o’clock precisely, he sometimes moved it up to eleven, which was how he finally noticed:

No matter what time of the morning he proceeded to march down that long corridor to his office, _Kenren always met him coming the other way in order to deliberately **not** salute him. _

At first Goujun thought it was uncanny.

Then he realized that it was just too much of a coincidence.

So he made one other little variation in his routine. Just as the general always carried that scent of cherry blossoms, the cherry tree in the garden near Goujun’s office held a distinct bouquet of Kenren … and sake. Kenren soaked in sake. Goujun peered up to where Kenren waited, half-straddling the largest bough, leaning against the trunk, arm slung over his eyes and forehead. It was clear to Goujun that he was listening for the sound of the dragon king’s own distinctive footfalls to echo down that corridor.

Finally, Goujun understood what Kenren had been trying to tell him.

There was only one thing left to do.

“Join me in my office, Kenren Taisho. Now.”

Goujun watched as Kenren lowered his arm, looked down and blinked once, before the dragon king turned on his heel and marched away.

It was only a minute after Goujun entered his room that Kenren followed, but Goujun was already seated behind his desk, scanning papers. There were a couple of things which needed his attention before he could devote himself to Kenren. So Kenren stood in the middle of the room, awkwardly scratching his head, Goujun rang for the messenger and calmly inked his responses.

Goujun’s servant knocked on the door.

“Enter!”

The kami bowed and moved to the center of the room, five steps behind Kenren.

“I will be with you in a few minutes,” Goujun continued, rolling up the scrolls and putting his seal upon them.

The servant stood at attention. The carriage clock on the commode ticked. Footfalls in the corridor tramped. Kenren stood at ease, fidgeting and clearing his throat. Goujun placidly kept brushing in instructions, and after the ink was laid, shook talc over the paper. Kenren sighed, which Goujun continued to ignore, until finally, the general pulled himself straight. It had only taken him fifteen minutes. Goujun set the last scroll in the basket, and instructed the messenger to their distribution.

As the latch snicked, Goujun cleared the last papers off his desk. He sat there for a moment, calmly regarding Kenren, wondering how best to begin, then promptly rose and walked over. “Remove your uniform.”

“What?” Kenren was immediately thrown off-center.

“You heard me.”

After a moment’s hesitation, as he appeared to struggle with the urge to bolt, Kenren started to peel off the heavy wool and leather until he stood in his undergarments.

Goujun lifted the edge of Kenren’s tank top a fraction of an inch off his shoulder on the tip of a sharp claw, and leaning over next to his ear, ordered, “Completely.”

Kenren’s eyes flew wide, but when a smirk started to flirt with the crook of his lips, Goujun strode over to the lacquered commode, threw open the doors and removed a riding crop. By the time, Goujun turned back, Kenren no longer smirked.

“You’re free to leave at any time.”

Kenren nodded, confirming this was also his choice.

Goujun circled Kenren, admiring the well-defined muscles and long, supple limbs. His skin held a undertone of coffee and milk; his features were strong, angular and evenly proportioned; he didn’t seem to have any problems with standing naked in front of his superior for this purpose, either, clearly unashamed of his body.

“Bend over the desk.”

Something … confusion? Panic? … rippled behind Kenren’s eyes. It was schooled the next second. Once his secret had been revealed, he had no intention of rebelling. Kenren walked over and leaned across the desk, setting his palms down to brace himself.

“Spread your legs so that your weight is evenly distributed.”

After Kenren complied, Goujun ran a hand over his back and down his thighs. How strange the skin of the warm-blooded kami felt, so heated and laced with muscles, so firmly stretched across those muscles, yet smooth under Goujun’s palm. He couldn’t resist stroking it, feeling it tremble under his touch. He could feel the pulse racing at different points. A faint sheen of moisture started to lift upon the surface—so different from the powdery dryness of dragon hide. Goujun glanced at Kenren’s face, fascinated.

He opened his lips to praise him, but before he could speak, Kenren turned his head away. Goujun’s chest clenched painfully.

For a moment, he took it as an insult, and the wave of anger coiled his fist back, the crop poised to release. He struggled with the emotion of that for a moment, fighting for grace, before he noticed something new.

Kenren was aroused. Goujun lowered the crop. This wasn’t rejection after all.

A sharp rap sounded upon the door.

“King Goujun, your Majesty?” Tenpou’s muted voice called.

“Enter.”

To his credit, Tenpou did not stand frozen with shock at Kenren’s predicament for long. He quickly shut the door behind him and turned the lock.

Dragon king and marshal stood at arms length and stared at each other, Tenpou obviously awaiting instruction. “You summoned me?”

“I’ve been considering how best to proceed,” Goujun explained, flicking the crop back and forth a few times with dramatic swooshing sounds. He knew how to use it to goad a battle charger, and corporal punishment was a form of discipline within the military, as a matter of tradition and at the Emperor’s command, although Goujun had never personally administered it himself--usually an officer of equal rank in the royal guard was tasked with that duty. Even then, Goujun had only ever authorized the use of it once, and in that case, only to ward off a capital sentence. So it felt strange and awkward to put on this fierce aspect for the purpose of striking someone sexually, even if it was clearly what Kenren wanted.

Tenpou nodded. It seemed that he had finally figured out why the young king had called for him, although Goujun wasn’t completely sure why, himself, other than it felt _fitting_ that he should be there.

“I take it the general is about to be punished for a transgression?”

“Just so.”

“Might I suggest a gag to keep his vocalizations contained? No point in alerting the entire palace to your, erm—project.” Tenpou reached into his pockets and pulled out something made of fabric, as though offering the use of a clean handkerchief. It was an old sock. He stared at it for awhile, scratching his head, as though wondering how it got there.

Goujun grabbed the tank top from the pile of Kenren’s clothes. Since Tenpou had forgotten to change his toilet slippers before responding to his summons, he didn’t even want to think where the sock had been. Rolling the shirt along its length, he passed it over to Tenpou.

Tenpou swept tender caresses down Kenren’s cheek. “Here, bite down on this. When you’re had enough, spit it out. We’ll take that as our sign.”

Kenren accepted the cloth. Tenpou rewarded him by planting several soft kisses along his scalp. His voice was very gentle as he said, “I’m going to restrain your arms now, do you understand?”

Kenren nodded, and after gripping him firmly by the arms, Tenpou signalled Goujun to begin.

The crop whistled. Kenren bucked as it flicked across his skin, a red comet-tail blooming in its wake. Goujun switched hands, drew back and brought it across from the other direction. The grunt that Kenren expelled from deep in his chest surprised Goujun. The strikes had to be more painful than they seemed. It was so hard to tell with warriors; some of them had such high pain thresholds.

Goujun had no intention of unleashing the full strength of his ire and frustration, no matter how much the general tried to goad him. The lure was there in dark, base impulses which pulled at his sinews and tested the force of his strikes, and but he was no animal. Goujun already knew the divine destruction he could wreak. It was written in the furious pace of his pulse, in the force field of humming energy that seemed to settle around his antlers, reverberating into his skull, battling him for control over his senses. He was an enlightened being with a refined mind and a functioning heart, a heart that was only willing to give Kenren what he needed for absolution, not to take thwarted aspirations out on his body. That path led to a downward spiral which Goujun could never halt.

He laid a few more marks in this cross pattern before stopping again, to run a palm over Kenren’s buttocks. Kenren jolted at the touch.

Again Goujun was fascinated by what his fingers told him. After only a few blows, the temperature of Kenren’s skin had leapt several degrees. He was glazed with moisture. The welts were also larger than they looked. Goujun reached over and ran his tongue across one of them. Salt and metal surged into his mouth. Kenren’s rattling hiss melted into a sensual moan. He pushed back as though offering.

Tenpou laughed and released one of Kenren’s arms long enough to ruffle his hair. He had pushed his glasses up onto his forehead since he appeared to be nearsighted and this would’ve allowed him to see Kenren’s expression more clearly. Goujun loved the colour of Tenpou’s eyes, and the tender expression on his face in that moment.

Goujun straightened and Tenpou gripped Kenren’s arms again, a warning for the general to fortify himself.

Cut followed cross-cut in a slow pattern, strikes followed by caresses. Seeds of blood sprouted on the shimmering surface of Kenren’s skin. His muscles were strung taut like overstretched wires.

Suddenly, a barely discernable shift took place. The energy in the room was like finely tempered glass on the verge of shattering. Goujun noticed that he, Kenren and Tenpou—they were all holding their breaths. Then he saw it: Kenren was trying to rub his erection against the hard surface of the desk, a futile effort since he was at the wrong angle for it. There was something inherently fragile about it, the compulsive impotency of a small child at the mercy of superior forces. The general had dropped his need for control.

So Goujun promptly dropped the crop. He reached under Kenren’s waist and wrapped a hand around him. The skin was wondrously soft and fine, like Tenpou’s. Kenren arched back, the line of his body a bow. He spat out the gag with a cry and reflexively bucked his hips, the contrast between pain and pleasure causing them to rock. Delightful moans tumbled over his lips. After a few strokes he stiffened, let out a strangled groan and spilled into Goujun’s hand.

Goujun lifted his hand. He tentatively tasted it with his tongue. The sight of Kenren lying spent and crumpled against the desktop set off surges of heat through Goujun’s body. His antlers felt tight and compacted. He felt a sudden need to do battle. He needed to lock horns with another dragon, someone of equal power, and wrestle the usurper to the ground. He needed to beat the earth into submission with the roiling, sinuous throes of ecstasy and death. The smell of musk and sweat unleashed his most primal instincts. If he didn’t take this puny god now, he would have to rip the foundation of heaven apart with his teeth and claws.

Goujun tore open the front his trousers and reached for him.

“Wait!” Tenpou shot to his feet and darted out around the desk. “Not yet.”

Goujun recoiled, startled--hissing with lust and fury. What was this insect--? How dare this--? The hairs beneath his scales bristled. He fought the urge to transform into his true shape, barely able to discern a lover beyond the shadows swirling past his vision. Every nerve in his body twitched to tear this intruder apart and claim his prize.

Tenpou, wisely sensed this overcharged irrationality, and dropped onto his hands and knees, forehead kissing the floor.

The miasma of Goujun’s vision cleared, a little. The low growls that he let off as warning subsided, a little. He retracted his claws, a little. He pulled his body back, a little.

Tenpou lifted his forehead. When he saw that he had space to speak, he said, “You will tear him to shreds. Please, I beg of you: let me help you prepare him.”

“Prepare him …, ” the dragon echoed, voice hollow. His senses were obscured, almost wholly swallowed by instinct. Reason was not breaking through. His blood coursed through him like an army on the rampage, violent.

“Yes, you need to stretch him before you take him, or you will damage him.”

“Stretch…” A shot of cool reason suddenly penetrated. Goujun stood down. Tenpou slowly stood to his feet and approached Goujun, careful to keep his gaze averted. He reached over and took the dragon king’s hand in his, slowly massaging the palm. His fingers were like cooling balm.

“Yes, just like I must stretch myself for you before you take me.” Tenpou plucked a finger across one of Goujun’s sharp claws, a speck of blood bloomed where it pricked through the skin. “Let me prepare him for you. Here, come watch how I do it for you.”

“For me …” Goujun settled back, bewildered, his heart still , his blood still hot, but not uncontrolled. He was willing to wait and see that this kami, also his lover, was not his rival.

Whatever Tenpou was doing, Kenren seemed to find quite pleasant, from the soft moans and sighs he let out. There was a quality to the sound which affected the dragon like honey, as though something sweet and slick dripped down his throat.

“ ’S’nice,” Kenren slurred. He was so incapacitated, as though drunk. Goujun looked over at Tenpou, uncertain.

“It’s the after-effects,” Tenpou quietly explained.

“I’ve never been able to bring you to this state.” Goujun marvelled at how deep and shaky his voice sounded.

Kenren laughed, sardonically. “No, not our dear Marsh’l. He never letsss--OW!”

Tenpou smacked a hand sharply across his bright red buttocks.

“It’s the after-effects of—” Tenpou pulled free. “Never mind, I have no desire to receive what he just went through, anyway. Besides, it looks like he’s now ready for you.”

Goujun reached over and pressed Tenpou to his chest, threading fingers through his hair and pulling him up for a kiss. He pushed his tongue past pliant lips, and coiled luxuriously around Tenpou’s mouth, in sweeps and curls, wavelets rippling on larger tides. At last they broke apart, breaths puffing; creases pressed into their clothing from the heat, the damp and the weight; leaning against each other, weak with lust.

Goujun turned to Kenren and, with a rustle of fabric, eased into the warmth and closeness of his body, shivering as skin slid against skin. He worked in a few gentle thrusts until Kenren’s hips began to sway in syncopation, meeting his rhythm.

Meanwhile, Tenpou had slid into Kenren’s mouth. When Goujun glanced up again, he was greeted with the sight of Tenpou’s head thrown back, his mouth working silently, as Kenren slowly, reflexively adjusted to being filled from both sides. The sight bewitched him, as though he could feel what the marshal felt, every stroke of the tongue, every swallowing ripple, every vibration of sound.

Goujun’s insides stormed with heightened pulses, breathlessness, and muscles rippling in contraction. Shadows filled his eyes, stronger than daylight. Soon pace and force increased. He moved and felt the world moving with him in corresponding increments, dizzying, frenzied, push for push, like tectonic plates shifting—the general, his subduction zone.

Thrusts shifted into surges of pleasure, some sort of tidal pattern which carried Goujun’s mind along as everything grew brilliant and fine, electrical and dazzling. Then he merged, body, mind and feeling with the one beneath him, through pleasure to the threshold of sleep--deep, black and dark like the bottom of the western seas.

By the time Goujun came back to his senses and conquered his clamouring heartbeat, Tenpou rested on the other side of Kenren, legs stretched out to brace himself. He was fumbling in the pockets of his lab coat for a cigarette.

Goujun pulled his reeling thoughts together. He fished up the riding crop and walked over to the cabinet to put it away, sorting through its odds and ends to see if he had something which he could use to soothe Kenren.

“I only have rubbing alcohol on hand,” He mentioned his concern to Tenpou. “It seems a bit--”

Tenpou nodded. Goujun appreciated how quickly, intuitively he understood what was required. The marshal walked over to Kenren’s uniform, sorted through the various pockets and fished out some ointment.

When Goujun glanced back and forth between the tube and the marshal, putting two and two together, Tenpou shrugged, “I told him that if he was going to rope you into doing this, he’d better come prepared, because you wouldn’t be.”

Goujun rolled his eyes. “Good to know you have a plan for all contingencies.”

“Why, yes, thank you. You chose me, remember?”

The cabinet held gauze, and after Goujun had attended to Kenren’s injuries, he wrapped the general in his coat to keep him warm. Carefully, the dragon king lifted him up under the torso, and Tenpou picked him up under the knees, and between the two of them, they shifted him over to the mats in the corner where Goujun and the marshal usually pursued their pleasures. They lay on either side of Kenren, embracing him, bolstering him between their bodies, lending him their warmth and companionship.

Tenpou, from the garlands of smoke he uncoiled around the room, was hard at thought. Goujun lingered in the joy of the moment for awhile, before the tramping of footfalls outside his door could reassert their patterns and rhythms over him.

In time, Kenren stirred.

The dragon-king wanted to say something about preferring not to be put in the position of doing that to the general again. Particularly in terms of the implicit pressure he’d been receiving from others to subdue him.

One look at Kenren’s face quashed that idea. It wasn’t only that Kenren would refuse and throw responsibility back onto him--a destiny he’d already assumed--but that he loved general’s free spirit and felt a need to protect that to his best ability. So, in the end, all Goujun could do was breathe a silent prayer that he wouldn’t be the one tasked with the fate of ending Kenren’s life.

Kenren finally sat up, hissing at the tender places abraded and compressed by any movement. He slowly rose to his feet and dressed, and Goujun and Tenpou followed suit, straightening the room and clearing away signs of their pastime. For some reason, Kenren started to whistle a tune as his aches and pains were neutralized by movement and activity. Goujun could tell he would probably be sore for a few days, but not unbearably so. At last he pulled on the last boot, got to his feet and started walking to the door.

“Kenren!” Tenpou cried out.

“Oh, right,” Kenren looked genuinely astonished. This time, he really had forgotten the proper protocol and courtesies. He wasn’t just ignoring them. Instead of waiting for Goujun to give him the go-ahead, he faced the dragon king in silent regard. Then Kenren reached across and laid a gentle kiss on Goujun’s lips. 

“Thank you,” he whispered, then whirled around and left.

Tenpou laughed nervously and seemed to feel the need to say, “Sorry about that.”

“It’s fine this once.” Goujun used Tenpou’s sock to rub oil off his desk, and handed it back to the marshal.

“Are we finished for now?”

“Yes, I suppose it’s time to get back to work. I see you brought the list of logistical supports we’ve commissioned. Shall we go over the requirements which need approval for the latest demonic subjugations?”

As the afternoon waned, the last thoughts Goujun directed to his general were to wonder when--if ever--they would meet again in the corridor outside his office, and if they had released enough energy during this encounter to neutralize the heavy destiny which seemed to chase Kenren. Did they achieve what Goujun secretly hoped for, a seismic shift in fate?

_\--fin--_

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: BDSM
> 
> Written to prompt for the old Livejournal Saiyuki giftfic exchange community, yuletide_smut (now on Dreamwidth.) Much gratitude for whymzycal's and kispexi_2's betas. Any mistakes that show up came after they looked at it last.


End file.
